Now that the kids are sent off to bed, I can sit down, look at the pictures, and remember how much fun we had over the last three days... In past years, I've split our three days of Christmas celebration into three different posts, but this year we'll do it all at once... This is what I want to remember:
The Jule Kaga
Every year for my entire life, I've eaten Jule Kaga. I can't have Christmas without it. I like to use my Nana's recipe, but it's tricky! I've had many years where I just couldn't get it right. My first batch this year had too much flour, too many kneaders, and...
(I'm so ashamed to admit this) I forgot the cardamom. It was awful. In my defense, I was seriously distracted by phone calls and toddler/baby interruptions. Instead of giving the failed bread to the chickens (like I'd ever do
that), we made it into bread pudding. I added the cardamom to the sugar/egg/milk mixture and we've never had better bread pudding.
The Christmas Cookies (and other treats)
We made gingerbread cookies. I used whole wheat to balance out the rest
of the sugar we consume this time of year. I had planned on making a
gingerbread house, but this is not the season of my life that I should add
extra duties. We just ate the candy plain.
Speaking of adding extra duties, arguing with Daniel on whether or not he has to go potty is no longer a priority. I'm choosing my battles with this kid. He makes excellent sugar cookies though!
This funny treats were made by melting candy on parchment paper at 350 degrees. My experimental batch was very thin and the kids loved crunching into it. Shane said (much to Mark's delight), "It's just like eating broken glass!" Hmmm, I wonder when he did that?
My Wonderful Husband
What can I say about Mark? He is awesome! He goes to any length to make these kids happy. And me too! Many years I have questioned his priorities and turned myself into Scrooge, The Grinch, and Mr. Krabbs. This year, I chilled out, took some vitamin D, and went with the spirit of Christmas. And he was right. Of course.
Christmas Adam
The kids and I had our traditional sleepover downstairs. We stayed up late watching Miracle on 34th Street and It's a Wonderful Life. Only Fiona and Ian made it to the end. I didn't. I ended up sleeping in my bed with my co-sleepers. Next year I will rejoin the Christmas Adam club.
Christmas Eve
Sometime during the Christmas Adam movie fest, a child left a gumdrop on Lula's blanket. And somehow, it got stuck to the back of her head the next morning.
She didn't like it.
This was all during our annual reading of The Best Christmas Pageant Ever. Which is one of the best Christmas books ever. I always cry at the end. My kids laugh like crazy when Gladys comes out yelling, "Hey! Unto you a child is born!" but they laugh ever harder when Imogene is yelling at people to stay away from her baby and that if she would have gotten to name him, his name would be Bill.
I was still working on Daniel's Christmas stocking on Christmas Eve. Right up to the very last minute. I finished it while we watched The Polar Express, another movie we watch every year. If I would have known I'd be knitting eight (so far) of these stockings, I would have picked a different pattern. I burned out on these before I even got Fiona's finished! With this one, I actually ripped out an entire motif and redid it. And I think I'm going to rip out the reindeer and redo them. I don't think I'll be able to look at them for 20 years if I don't...
Christmas Day
Before the chaos
Sometime during the night, a special person arrived. I should say people, because there were two of them! Laura and "Big" Shane were able to come for Christmas! When Ian found out they would be here for Christmas morning, he said, "Christmas wishes do come true!" and "It would be really boring with just us!" Sorry Ian, I can't agree with the second one-it is never boring here!
Santa had mercy on the dogs and brought them giant chew sticks. Mina was so excited that she couldn't sleep! Mark had to get up and hide the chew sticks in the oven so the dogs would settle down. Why is this something to remember? Stay with me...
During the chaos, Jack is just hanging out in the middle of all the kids. He hardly even moved when we threw things at him!
All he wanted to do was take his bone outside and run around, but Mark wouldn't let him.
Mark said to Fiona, "Do I get a Christmas snuggle?" Fiona replied, "Okaaay, but I just put on my lipstick!" Her watermelon scented chapstick was probably her favorite gift!
Lula slept through the present opening, but she was up in time to show off that she learned to sit all by herself on her first Christmas!
The girls got ballerina outfits (Fiona's request to Santa) and stuffed animals (Evie's request).
Ian and Shane got two video games for our old Nintendo 64. Santa's elves had to go through a used video game store to find them (plus new, refurbished controllers)! They spent the entire day playing Majora's Mask and Tetris. Shane didn't even get dressed. They didn't even need any of the other presents they got.
Fiona, my fancy girl, loved her "lipstick" and her new nail polish. She made sure Daniel got his nails polished a nice manly orange and that his lips were nicely...lipsticked. It's a good thing Daniel is so... well, I don't have to worry about Fiona having too much of a feminine influence on him.
Yes, he loves having his nails "painted" and watching Bina Bina Bina Bina, but he also loves Thomas the Train and fighting with his brothers. I think having all these sisters will benefit him in the long run. He'll know how to treat them kindly (ahem) and what makes them tick.
Okay, back to the dogs and the bones. They managed to consume one entire bone. It started out as Mina's, but Jack started to eat it after his was taken away when he tried to take it outside. They took turns tricking each other into leaving the bone somewhere and claiming it when the other dog was gone. When we realized what they were doing, Mark returned the other bone. But they wouldn't eat it. So at the end of the day we had Jack chewing on the end of Mina's bone and Mina hoarding:
...the whole bone. Which has been confiscated again because I do not want to get up with the dogs in the middle of the night because they have a tummy ache. They are not my dogs, but Mark can't hear them whine through his earplugs.
Christmas Dinner
While Mark cooked our awesome dinner, the rest of us played. We ate the last of our turkey hens and it came out perfectly. And since he had been hearing so much about Laura's gravy, he had to prove that he could also make tasty gravy from scratch. It was tasty alright! We had to take a family picture around the table (Daniel, after eating candy all day long and not taking a nap, is climbing up my chair like a crazy monkey and is not pictured):
Rats, Evie wasn't smiling-try again!
Oh No! Lula is hidden behind the juice pitcher! One more time!
Good enough!
Merry Christmas!
